The present invention relates to machines which inspect bottles for defects and more particularly to such machines wherein a bottle is conveyed through one or more inspection stations via a star wheel conveyor.
In state of the art glass bottle inspection machines bottles are transferred to a star wheel conveyor which transports the bottles through a number of inspection stations.
In such machines the bottles are conventionally rotated at one or more of the inspection stations and as a result, should the bottles be non-round (a flask for example), the bottles would be released from the star wheel at a random orientation and this is undesirable.
It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide an orienting mechanism which will reorient a non-round bottle conveyed by a star wheel conveyor to a selected orientation prior to discharge.
Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following portion of this specification and from the accompanying drawings which illustrate, in accordance with the mandate of the patent statutes, a presently preferred embodiment incorporating the principles of the invention.